Born in Quairading (Ballardung Country) in the south-west of Western Australia, Shane Pickett was one of the foremost Nyoongar artists of his generation. Combining his deep knowledge and concern for Nyoongar culture with a confident and individual style of gestural abstraction, Pickett’s paintings resonated with a profound but subtle immediacy. Balancing innovation with tradition, modernity with an ancient spirituality, they were complex visual metaphors for the persistence of Nyoongar culture against the colonising tide of modernity. Shane was selected as a finalist in numerous major art prizes including the Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award, and in 2006 he was awarded first prizes at the Sunshine Coast Art Prize and Joondalup Invitation Art Award. In 2007, Shane Pickett was awarded first prize in the Inaugural Drawing Together Art Award. He has exhibited in every state and territory in Australia, and his works are held in major private and public collections across the country.

COLLECTIONS

Art Gallery of Western Australia Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory National Gallery of Australia, Canberra National Gallery of Victoria National Museum of Australia Western Australian Museum Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, Canberra Australian Parliament House Collection, Canberra Banyule City Council Collection, Victoria Berndt Museum of Anthropology, University of Western Australia BHP Collection, Western Australia Burswood Collection, Western Australia Caloundra Regional Art Gallery, Queensland Charles Darwin University, Northern Territory City of Canning Collection, Western Australia City of Fremantle Collection, Western Australia City of Joondalup Collection, Western Australia City of Perth Collection, Western Australia City of Wanneroo Collection, Western Australia Department of the Environment and Water Resources, Canberra Edith Cowan University, Western Australia Fiona Stanley Hospital Collection, Western Australia Flinders University Art Collection, Adelaide, South Australia Holmes a Court Collection, Western Australia King Edward Memorial Hospital, Western Australia Murdoch University Art Collection, Western Australia Nillumbik Shire Council Art Collection, Greensborough, Victoria Rockhampton City Art Gallery, Rockhampton Royal Perth Hospital, Western Australia Sir Charles Gardiner Hospital Collection, Western Australia Subiaco Museum, Subiaco, Western Australia Swinburne University of Technology, Victoria Woodside Energy Ltd. Collection, Western Australia University of Western Sydney Collection, New South Wales Artbank Collection Perth Arena, Western Australia